To do lists seem like a good idea in theory, but they have a major disadvantage: there are infinite potential to do items. Instead, Tim Ferriss, best-selling author of The 4-Hour Workweek (and a speaker of 6 languages), recommends “not to do lists” instead since they define a limited number of unhelpful behaviors to avoid. This idea applies perfectly to language learning, where most learners waste a lot of time on ineffective methods and bad materials. Read on to see my list of NOT to do items for successful language learners.
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I do generally agree with these points, but I think there are a lot of caveats to #1. It seems like it’s become quite fashionable on the Web to criticise traditional language learning methods. If you spent 50% of your time memorising and studying grammar (i.e. ‘learning’), and the other 50% actively engaging with the real stuff (‘acquiring’), I think you’d make excellent progress. 95:5 seems a bit extreme.
Also, I’m not sure about downplaying translation in that way. Translation is a real art and takes a lot of practice to become proficient. If you just want to communicate with native speakers then sure, it’s not that necessary. But I think learning foreign languages without studying translation skills is a real wasted opportunity.
Thank you for your comment. While some criticism of traditional methods may be a matter of fashion, I think the bulk of it stems from a growing realization that all the time and money spent in classrooms produces very poor results for most learners, while more and more are successfully acquiring languages on their own through intensive, self-guided immersion using readily available online (and offline) tools and an ever growing pool of both learner-specific and authentic content.
I have worked in translation and have nothing but respect for the profession (and the skills required to do it well). But it all comes down to each individual’s goals. Not every foreign language learner wants to become a translator; most just want to use the language as a communication tool at work, with friends, or on the street.
In my experience as both a learner and teacher, translation is one of the major impediments to reaching fluency. On the other hand, once you actually reach an advanced level of oral and written fluency in a language, learning to translate will be that much easier.
I absolutely agree with you, and absolutely disagree with the immersion-only fad. I am currently struggling with this after having moved to a country that speaks a language different from my own. The language program my company sent me to is an immersion program. But …. my LIFE is immersion. Having more of that is of no use. I need the keys to the language. What is the structure? How does it work? I will NEVER get that, at least not in any kind of efficient way, by “soaking it up” from listening to what to me sounds like a long stream of unintelligible babble. So please, just tell me the rules. Because language does have rules. Why keep it a secret when attempting to teach?
I agree with most of these, I think this is a pretty good list that will go a long ways towards getting a beginner on the right track in that it does address common mistakes people tend to make, though I would say that at the VERY beginning it’s useful to just rote memorize like maybe the 200 most common words in a language (“is”, “go”, “person”, “he”, “she”, etc.) prior to doing anything else, if you wanted me to point out an exception.
Cheers,
Andrew
Thank you for your kind feedback, Andrew. Memorizing a small set of basic words can certainly be a good way to jump into a new language, and there are many excellent tools to help one do so more efficiently (spaced repetition, Tony Buzan’s “Master Memory Matrix”, etc.). But in my experience, memorization of explicit information lends itself better to the written word, and does little for the ability to understand or produce the spoken language. WIth this in mind, I prefer to get my ears used to the language first, and then back up my listening tasks with reading.
By the way folks, these articles were originally posted years ago and have collected quite a few comments that I am now working to reinstall as I rebuild the site.
John, Great list. As always great stuff and good reminders. I just added this article in my “read more” section of a new ten week email program I have to help people get started. I am excited to send people over to your writing. Glad you got all the bugs worked out too and are back up and running.
Thank you, Aaron. While it is a hassle to rebuild the site, I am taking it as an opportunity to make things even better than before. And please feel free to include excerpts of any other articles you want.
I definitely don’t spend more than 5% of my time studying English formally. Very nice post!
Thank you “Miss Language Learning”.
Thank you John! I agree with all information in this post. I help learners to organize their time, life and learning. So this post is more than helpful.
Thank you very much, Lana! Life is learning, and I think it’s great you help people better manage time and free up more time for learning.
And on this one, too.
Awesome article! What are your recommended methods of input? Should I listen to audio in a foreign language even if I don’t understand barely any of it?
Thank you, Jack. I recommend audio, video, and text input (in that order of preference) that fits your interests and is not too far beyond your level of comprehension. That is more difficult in the beginning of course (when almost all input will be incomprehensible) but you can help make sense of audio or video input with the help of transcripts and sub-titles. I usually pick podcasts which have transcripts available and then alternate between listening only, listening while reading, and reading only.
Hi! I agree with most of everything said but there’s just one thing that bugs me a little. I can’t say that I’ve learnt a lot of languages by myself because most of the few languages I speak were kind of given to me, I just was in the right environment (those are Russian, Spanish and English). But then, four years ago, I started speaking to japanese people. Just because I wanted to know a little more about Japan, I was curious. Now I’m fluent at speaking but I almost can’t read at all. Now I have a goal, which is to pass the noken 1 within the next two years. Now, what I wanted to say with these is, that I don’t know to what extend the use of the ‘rote’ memory is bad for a person that already speaks a language. The only thing I do to learn kanji is to import kanji from basic kanji book to anki and write them over and over again until I get it right. That’s it. But it works (I spend 2-4 hours a day to learn 15-25 kanji).
Thank you for your comment, れいちゃん. Being in the right environment certainly does help, but the beauty of learning languages today is that you can create an immersion environment no matter where you live. Regarding rote memorization, if it works for you, then go for it. But in my experience, you can learn 15-25 characters a day in less than an hour if you use good mnemonics and imaginative memory. Moreover, your retention will be far better for far longer.
It’s hard to disagree with any of the “Don’ts”. While we all (see the comments below!) seem to have slightly different “means and methods”, maybe based on our own learning or teaching experience, learners will benefit from this list of “Don’ts”: Hearing what NOT TO DO, lets them also improve the learning practices that work best for them.
Thank you for your comment, Ulrike. We all do indeed have different experiences, and some methods work better for some than others, but I agree that these NOT TO DO items apply to almost everyone.